


Behind Closed Doors

by Enedda



Series: A Study in Marcus [4]
Category: The Exorcist (TV)
Genre: I'm so sorry but there's poetry, Marcus and books, Marcus reads everything, Other, a little mention of self-harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-08
Updated: 2018-04-08
Packaged: 2019-04-20 06:38:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14255127
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Enedda/pseuds/Enedda
Summary: Another silent evening at St Aquinas. Almost nothing happens. And there are universes hidden in every "almost"...





	Behind Closed Doors

The light of the small lamp flickered. Marcus reached under it and touched the lightbulb, trying to make it even again. The thing wasn't at its best from the day of the storm... that would be for over two weeks now. He stretched and folded his arms behind his head, looking out the window. The age is indeed getting to my eyes, he thought.

It was a silent evening at St Aquinas. In the schedule, it was called "Recreation", but for him, it was time for himself. A brain-spa time. Which equalled reading. Drawing was for afternoons when there still was natural light outside. The rest of the priests were sent to see a movie: there was a new version of some Biblical story, full of shouting and loud music. For him, they could add some robots and aliens and it would make more sense than this. Nobody could force him, even Fr. Michal, an immigrant from Warsaw, who was his personal favourite.

Reading was important. It was a way out. Out of any place, even from here. This place was full of broken dreams, lost faith and old woollen cassocks, not even black anymore.

Maybe he did fit in here.

But no, he didn't. He felt like an oddly made set of dentures in the mouth of an ordinary person. During evenings like this, when the risk of using the sharpened cross on his rosary on his battered skin was much too high, he dived deep into reading, not giving himself enough time even to breathe.

The subject of the book wasn't very important - he would read anything, maybe not a romance, but they happened from time to time, too - was _Histoire d'O_ a romance? It was mainly the very act of reading that helped. Even if it was a quick read of the label of the shampoo bottle in the bathroom.

Today he had read his fair share of the Bible and didn't feel like more religious study. Maybe poetry? That was an idea. He should have little Neruda somewhere...

Marcus looked at his desk. It wasn't a mess, he was a rather tidy person, but he had a lot of books there mixed up with drawings, pens, pencils and even some branches he used as models. Where was this book? Sadly, it was little. But it was pink, that should help...

As if, he remembered covering it with black paper, so the visiting bishop wouldn't spot it. This guy had a police dog's nose for Things That Priests Should Not Read and he had enough troubles already.

Ah, there it is. Under the bloody lamp. Of course, because of reasons. He skipped a few pages and stopped on a poem he knew by heart. With closed eyes, with the book in hand, he started saying it in a hushed tone.

_I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where._

_I love you simply, without problems or pride:_

_I love you in this way because I do not know any other way of loving but this,_

_in which there is no I or you, so intimate that your hand upon my chest is my hand,_

_so intimate that when I fall asleep your eyes close*._

And they say to love like this, to want like this, is a sin. Marcus smiled softly. He was old enough to understand. Fools says I, he thought.

My God is love.

 

_*_ P.Neruda _, 100 Love Sonnets_


End file.
